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a breakup letter
Apr. 29th, 2008 07:59 pmdear Windows,
fuck you.
seriously. fuck you.
we've had our ups and downs, mostly downs, during our eleven-and-a-half-year affair. we got together back in December of '96, when my parents bought a Windows box as the new family computer. the eleven years before that, since the time my family got a computer, i had been using macs. but, my parents were getting tired of not being able to run certain programs that weren't mac-compatible, so the old Mac Classic got relegated to the master bedroom...and the windows box took its place.
i moved to college, and used a laptop with Windows. i went to law school and got another laptop with Windows, because it was the only OS on which the exam-taking software would run. i didn't know enough about computers then to realise that i could run something other than Windows for finals taking, and that i could just run ExamSoft over a Windows emulator. i was naive then.
i felt captive most of that time. sure, each of those computers ran great for the first few months i had them. then...they slowed...and slowed. the first computer finally became unusable after i had the audacity to erase all vestiges of Internet Explorer, and Windows decided not to work. i figured...hey, i didn't use it and it was taking up valuable space on my 3GB hard drive, so i may as well remove it, right? Windows disagreed. i finally learned why, my second year of law school--while reading the antitrust case against Microsoft. sneaky little fuckers, hiding necessary system files in their piece-of-crap web browser so we can't delete it.
for the longest time, i was scared to try anything else, though. i thought it would be too hard to learn. i was too busy. i wasn't happy with Windows, but inertia and apathy stopped me from doing anything else.
i always get more productive the closer finals week draws. sure, i don't get more productive about school. but, i find other projects to keep me busy, things that are important enough that i can justify doing them instead of studying. this time, it has been learning linux.
am i a Linux Power User yet? no way. but, i know my way around...and it runs faster than Windows even now, when it's running on Wubi (an emulator), over Windows. i'm learning system administration slowly but surely. i'm learning the applications, and it's true...whatever stuff i wanted to do on Windows, there's something on Linux that works just as well. since my Experiment With Linux started, i've been booting into Windows less and less. except for my finals...by last week, i had stopped booting into Windows entirely.
today, i'm doing it. i bought an external hard drive, that i'm saving my files to. once my system is backed up, Windows is toast. Ubuntu 8.04 is going on here for real. for the first time, i'm going to have a personal computer without Windows, and it's going to be great.
sure, this won't be like one of my normal breakups. i know better than to think that i'm never going to see you again. i'll have to use Windows at work. when i get my new computer this summer, i'll have to partition the hard drive and keep Windows on a small slice of it...just in case i do have to run a program that will only run in Windows, and acts weird over Wine [a Windows emulator for Linux]. as much as you suck, Windows, i know that there's always a chance that i'm going to be forced to put up with you. but, i'm going to use that partition as little as possible.
goodbye Windows. you've given me a hard time for the last eleven and a half years...but today, it's over. today, i'm taking control of this machine...which means you have no control over it any more.
rot in hell,
the persecuted crack smoker
fuck you.
seriously. fuck you.
we've had our ups and downs, mostly downs, during our eleven-and-a-half-year affair. we got together back in December of '96, when my parents bought a Windows box as the new family computer. the eleven years before that, since the time my family got a computer, i had been using macs. but, my parents were getting tired of not being able to run certain programs that weren't mac-compatible, so the old Mac Classic got relegated to the master bedroom...and the windows box took its place.
i moved to college, and used a laptop with Windows. i went to law school and got another laptop with Windows, because it was the only OS on which the exam-taking software would run. i didn't know enough about computers then to realise that i could run something other than Windows for finals taking, and that i could just run ExamSoft over a Windows emulator. i was naive then.
i felt captive most of that time. sure, each of those computers ran great for the first few months i had them. then...they slowed...and slowed. the first computer finally became unusable after i had the audacity to erase all vestiges of Internet Explorer, and Windows decided not to work. i figured...hey, i didn't use it and it was taking up valuable space on my 3GB hard drive, so i may as well remove it, right? Windows disagreed. i finally learned why, my second year of law school--while reading the antitrust case against Microsoft. sneaky little fuckers, hiding necessary system files in their piece-of-crap web browser so we can't delete it.
for the longest time, i was scared to try anything else, though. i thought it would be too hard to learn. i was too busy. i wasn't happy with Windows, but inertia and apathy stopped me from doing anything else.
i always get more productive the closer finals week draws. sure, i don't get more productive about school. but, i find other projects to keep me busy, things that are important enough that i can justify doing them instead of studying. this time, it has been learning linux.
am i a Linux Power User yet? no way. but, i know my way around...and it runs faster than Windows even now, when it's running on Wubi (an emulator), over Windows. i'm learning system administration slowly but surely. i'm learning the applications, and it's true...whatever stuff i wanted to do on Windows, there's something on Linux that works just as well. since my Experiment With Linux started, i've been booting into Windows less and less. except for my finals...by last week, i had stopped booting into Windows entirely.
today, i'm doing it. i bought an external hard drive, that i'm saving my files to. once my system is backed up, Windows is toast. Ubuntu 8.04 is going on here for real. for the first time, i'm going to have a personal computer without Windows, and it's going to be great.
sure, this won't be like one of my normal breakups. i know better than to think that i'm never going to see you again. i'll have to use Windows at work. when i get my new computer this summer, i'll have to partition the hard drive and keep Windows on a small slice of it...just in case i do have to run a program that will only run in Windows, and acts weird over Wine [a Windows emulator for Linux]. as much as you suck, Windows, i know that there's always a chance that i'm going to be forced to put up with you. but, i'm going to use that partition as little as possible.
goodbye Windows. you've given me a hard time for the last eleven and a half years...but today, it's over. today, i'm taking control of this machine...which means you have no control over it any more.
rot in hell,
the persecuted crack smoker
